Often, you won’t need to know who is acting precisely when, but in contests and conflicts turn order can become important. These scenes take place over a series of exchanges. In an exchange, each involved character can take one overcome, create an advantage, or attack action, and can move once. (Contests work slightly differently; see page XX.) Because defending is a reaction to someone else’s action, characters can defend as many times as they need to during other characters’ turns, so long as they can justify their ability to interfere based on what’s already been established in the story.

At the start of a scene, the GM and players decide who goes first based on the situation, then the active player picks who goes next. The GM’s characters are selected in the turn order just like the PCs, with the GM deciding who goes next after the NPCs have acted. After everyone has taken a turn, the last player picks who goes next at the start of the next exchange.

Cassandra and Ruth have stumbled across a small group of cultists, led by an acolyte in a golden mask, performing some arcane ritual. Because the cultists are focused on their work, the GM declares that the PCs will go first in this conflict. The players decide that Cassandra will act first: she creates an advantage against the masked cultist, Distracted, by running directly at them screaming. It’s crude but effective. To make the best use of the situation aspect, Cassandra’s player decides that Ruth should go next. Ruth throws a dagger at the masked acolyte, and immediately invokes Distracted to improve her attack. It’s not enough to take out the acolyte in one hit, but it is a one-two punch that leaves the cultist reeling.

Unfortunately, now that all the PCs in the scene have acted, Ruth has no choice but to pick one of the cultists to go next. She chooses the masked acolyte. The GM smiles, because they know that once the acolyte acts, she can have the cultists act until the end of the round, at which point they can choose the masked acolyte to start the next exchange. The PCs may have gotten a good first hit in, but now the cultists get to fight back.

This method of determining turn order goes by several names in online discussion: elective action order, and “popcorn,” “handoff,” or “Balsera Style” initiative, the last one named after Fate Core author Leonard Balsera, who planted the seed of the idea. You can learn more about this method and its strategies at https://www.deadlyfredly.com/2012/02/marvel/